Publications

In order to provide a better information base of the industry, the Ministry of Education commissioned BRC Marketing & Social Research to conduct a census of providers of ESOL programmes for international students. These providers included primary and secondary schools, community education facilities, universities, polytechnics, English language schools, (other) private training establishments (PTEs), colleges of education, and wananga.

The size of the tertiary student population is an indicator of the accessibility of tertiary education. It is also a key determinant of the levels of human capital that will be available to the New Zealand labour force
The purpose of this report is to note the influence of projected population change on the tertiary education system. It comments on the implications of demographic change for the size and make-up of the tertiary student population, the network of public provision and, to a lesser extent, on the levels of human educational capital the tertiary system produces.

New Zealand has one of the lowest reported higher education qualification completion rates in the OECD, significantly below Australia. Why do so many New Zealand students not complete their qualification? This paper looks behind some of the numbers in an attempt to better understand and assess New Zealand's performance compared with Australia and internationally. It looks, for example, at the impact of part-time and partial qualification study on completion rates. New Zealand has the highest reported level of part-time study in the OECD, and one in eight bachelor’s-degree students in New Zealand pass every subject they've enrolled in, yet have not completed their degree after five years. What does this tell us about intentions and about how we should gauge success?

The paper takes another look at some international comparisons focussing on full-time students, and also looks at the impact of transfers, changing qualifications, and what happens to rates when a ten-year window is taken instead of a five-year window.

This paper outlines the approach taken by the Ministry of Education to identify areas of potential tuition subsidy under- or over-funding, its limitations, and the key results. It also discusses how this analysis has informed tertiary education policy advice, and the Government's decisions to increase tuition subsidy rates in targeted areas.

The aim of the Secondary Tertiary Alignment Resource (STAR) programme is to enable schools to facilitate smooth transition and access from schooling to assists student transition to further education or employment. This evaluation of STAR was undertaken to provide sound information on the operation of STAR in schools and gather the views of key stakeholders (students, teachers, tertiary providers and industry/employers) on how successfully STAR achieves its aims. It also identified and collected data on outcome measures that could help assess how successfully STAR is meeting its objectives.

This paper summarises data on engagement and achievement in science across primary and secondary schools. This information has been collated across national and international studies undertaken over the last 15 years. This information raises key issues for policy and practice and these are discussed briefly.

The Ministry of Education has identified the need to further explore the use of Virtual Learning Environments particularly in the context of te reo Māori and kaupapa Māori education. This literature review was sought to provide further understanding for the Ministry of Education in this area.

This report reviews the literature on computer-assisted learning, particularly its effects on learning outcomes. The evidence regarding the use of computer-assisted learning in literacy and numeracy is assessed, as well as the use of integrated learning systems. The report then looks at evidence from research studies on the value of computer-assisted learning including SuccessMaker. Pre-conditions for effective computer-assisted learning are also examined.

Author(s): Dr Judy M Parr and Irene Fung, School of Education, University of Auckland.

School Entry Assessment (SEA) is a tool designed to provide teachers with information about some of the knowledge and skills children have when they first begin school. SEA has been available for use in schools since 1997. In August 2001 a survey was undertaken to obtain an up-to-date picture of the extent to which new entrant teachers were using SEA, whether they were using the whole resource or only one or two of the three components, and whether they considered changes needed to be made to the SEA kit to improve its validity and usefulness. The report details the results from this survey.

The study considered a population of first-year bachelors-degree students at university, who had all achieved the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) level 3 and attained the University Entrance standard.

The achievement patterns of candidates involved in Māori-medium education, and whether they differ from the general population, are of interest to many groups, including school communities and policy makers.

Achievement at public tertiary education institutions has improved for both full-time and part-time students.

Achievement at private training establishments has improved for full-time students, while it declined slightly for part-time students.

This analyses looks at whether rates of achievement have been improving and whether there are differences in achievement for men and women, or between ethnic groups. It looks at 10 cohorts of domestic tertiary education students. The first cohort of students started study in 1996 and the last cohort of students started study in 2005. For each cohort, the rate of qualification completion was calculated five years after starting study.

Adult literacy is considered to be vital to the economic wellbeing of developed countries. The increasing complexity of our society and the need for a more flexible and highly-educated workforce mean that individuals need to be able to comprehend and apply information of varying difficulty from a range of sources to function effectively at work and in everyday life. Therefore, governments and international organisations are especially keen for some insight into any possible deficiencies in literacy and numeracy skills.

Demand for people in the workplace with advanced skills is increasing. Having more people with advanced qualifications is one part of the solution. This report finds that the areas of study where there is high unmet demand for advanced qualifications include information technology, engineering, building and health.

There is a limited number of areas where it is clear that increasing the number of people with trade, technical or professional qualifications would definitely reduce skill shortages. These areas are in engineering, building and medical professions. Demand in these areas has been driven by increased use of technology, increased construction activity and increased demand for health services. In other areas examined in the report, improving the quality and relevance of qualifications is likely to be as important, or even more important, than increasing the number of people graduating.

This is report is the second in a series of three reports looking at the supply of and demand for advanced trade, technical and professional qualifications. The first report, looking at demand for qualifications is available on Education Counts.

The overall purpose of this research was to collect a range of information about indicators of good practice and quality outcomes in alternative education programmes. The key areas the report addresses include the following: identification of the critical success factors/indicators of success in alternative education programmes; hallmarks of quality programmes and quality alternative education providers; and identification of what constitutes successful outcomes in alternative education programmes.

Analysis showed that when the PBRF is fully implemented there will be significant funding attracted by high performing researchers for their TEOs.
There is now a significant incentive for TEOs to ensure the successful completion of research graduates, with the majority of government funding for these students now tied to their successful completion.

This aim of this report is to review education literature and clarify key evidence towards improved learning and achievement outcomes for Pasifika learners. It identifies priorities for future research in Pasifika education.

Arts Professional Development Online' commenced nationally during 2001 to support the implementation of 'Arts in the New Zealand Curriculum', targeted specifically at rural and isolated schools. This report details the outcome of an evaluation of this professional development that was carried out late 2002.

Equity Funding is a small amount of additional funding for early childhood education (ECE) services intended to reduce educational disparities between different groups, reduce barriers to participation for groups underrepresented in ECE, and support ECE services to raise their level of educational achievement. This evaluation of the initial uses and impact of Equity Funding, funded by the Ministry of Education, is intended to contribute to the development of policy within the early childhood education sector.

The Ministry of Education commissioned this evaluation to examine three aspects of professional development (PD) in the early childhood education (ECE) sector: describing the current delivery of PD; identifying barriers and success factors for delivery of the PD programmes; and identifying their impact. The evaluation covered the provision of whole centre PD in the calendar year 2000.

The purpose of the evaluation was to evaluate the effectiveness of government funded early childhood education (ECE) professional development in meeting the agreed programme outcome of strengthening teacher, educator, kaiako, faiaoga, faiako and puapi’i capability and quality in practice, in order to extend positive learning outcomes for children, based on the principles of Te Whāriki.

Author(s): Sue Cherrington and Deborah Wansbrough, Victoria University of Wellington.

This reports on an evaluation of how the professional development, offered on a national basis to schools over a two-year period commencing 2001, supported the initial implementation of 'Arts in the New Zealand Curriculum'. This included a survey of participants on their views of the issues they and their schools faced in implementing the curriculum and how they considered the professional development assisted them in addressing these issues.

This research evaluates three educational programmes in the Auckland area for children with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The programmes evaluated were Autism Action Precision Teaching Centre (AAPTC) programme, intensive Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA) home-based programmes, and mainstream pre-school and school education. The report describes each service, their cost and how effective the programmes were in providing education for children with ASD ending with recommendations and conclusions regarding educational programmes for children with ASD.

This research was jointly funded by the Ministry of Education and the New Zealand Qualifications Authority. We particularly thank Geoff Gibbs and Steve Bargh for their interest, encouragement, and for including us in the professional development sessions.

This report was commissioned in 2008 by the Ministry of Education to determine the effectiveness of the language and culture immersion experiences for teachers on Language and Culture Immersion Experiences (LCIE) programmes. This report provides recommendations which will inform future language and culture immersion initiatives and assist with our long term planning for languages support and delivery. It covers a research period from 2005 to 2009.

School Entry Assessment (SEA) is an instrument designed to assess schools entrants' skills in early literacy, early numeracy, and oral language. It was first introduced in New Zealand schools in 1997. The primary purpose of SEA is to provide diagnostic data for teachers to use to improve student learning. The Australian Council for Educational Research was contracted by the Ministry of Education in 2001 to evaluate the technical and methodological aspects of SEA. The purpose of the evaluation was to provide information which would enhance the collation and analysis of SEA data. The results from this evaluation are contained in the following report.

This research identifies effective teacher practice for integrating commercially-produced readymade learning materials into classrooms to meet student learning needs. The research focused on practice with respect to literacy packages but the findings have resonance for other curriculum areas. The project investigated how low decile schools integrated five selected reading packages into their classroom reading programmes over two years, and identified effective practice around identifying and diagnosing student needs, selecting appropriate packages based on these needs, implementing the package and ongoing monitoring and evaluation. Sustainability was also considered.

This project concerns evaluations of three programmes - Cool Schools, Kiwi Can and Tū Tangata - supported in 2002 from the Innovations Funding Pool. The main purpose of the evaluation is around the sustainability, adaptability and the transferability between schools of the programmes selected, and the extent to which and how the programmes have variously brought about positive (academic, social and behavioural) change for students, particularly those at risk of poor educational achievement.

The primary purpose of this report is to examine and describe the relationship between family structure and family wellbeing and the educational qualifications of parents in New Zealand families over the period 1981–2006.

This document is an introduction for language teachers to the concept known as intercultural communicative language teaching and learning. It is a summary of a Ministry of Education-commissioned report, Intercultural Communicative Language Teaching: Implications for Effective Teaching and Learning, produced through Victoria University of Wellington by Jonathan Newton, Eric Yates, Sandra Shearn, and Werner Nowitzki (the Newton report).

Author(s): This summary was written by Janet Rivers, based on a report written by Jonathan Newton, Eric Yates, Sandra Shearn and Werner Nowitzki of Victoria University of Wellington

This report was commissioned by the Ministry and undertaken by the Waikato Institute of Technology. It investigated the factors that lead New Zealand polytechnic and institutes of technology tutors to adopt or resist the incorporation of e-learning approaches into their teaching practices. It utilised case studies, focus group interviews, and national surveys in order to establish these factors and included consideration of perspectives from both tutors and organisational management. In terms of the tutors it focused on four main groups: early adopters, later adopters, intending adopters, and resisters.

This occasional paper examines the performance of New Zealand universities in the 2010 Shanghai Jiao Tong University Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU). In particular, the analysis examines the data behind the overall rankings to get a more comprehensive picture of the level of performance of New Zealand universities.

This group of five studies reports on aspects of the AUSAD initiative in Mangere and Otara that is designed to improve the capacity of the schools to analyse, share and learn from their student achievement information.

This report examines the quantitative evidence on the impact of the Performance-Based Research Fund (PBRF) in a variety of areas ranging from research impact to completion rates of higher research degrees.

This report is complemented by an analysis of PBRF 2012 Quality Evaluation results, released August 2013.

This is the home page for the Annual Monitoring of Reading Recovery publication series.

As part of the continuing evaluation of the implementation of Reading Recovery, schools with Reading Recovery are asked to provide information for the Ministry of Education on an annual basis. This information is used to examine trends in the delivery of Reading Recovery and the progress of students, and to assist the Ministry in developing policies regarding literacy.

This report was commissioned by the Ministry and undertaken by the Universal College of Learning in collaboration with Otago Polytechnic. It examined the multiplicity of staff development (SD) being offered in the polytechnic, university and college of education sectors. It used case study research methodology. It not only examined the current status of SD for e-learning across the tertiary sector, but also other factors impacting on staff experiences with e-learning.

More domestic and international students studied at higher levels and in longer qualifications in April 2009 compared with April 2008.

Formal enrolments increased from April 2008 to April 2009 by 2.8 percent and when this number is converted to equivalent full-time student units the increase was bigger – up by 6.2 percent. This means that the average study load per student has risen.

A rise in enrolments by 18 to 24 year-olds was the main driver of the latest increase, while fewer people aged 40 years or over studied in April 2009.

Topics covered in this factsheet include qualification levels, place of study, age and ethnic group, student allowances and student loans.

This analysis looks at the association of school subject and school achievement on university performance. The school subjects considered are those on the ‘approved list’ of subjects for the New Zealand university entrance requirement.

This is an initial statistical report on the Literacy and Numeracy for Adults Assessment Tool in terms of the extent of its use in 2011, the first full year of implementation, the reading and numeracy profiles of learners when first assessed, and the extent to which learners can be seen to have increased their reading and numeracy skills over the course of the 2011 year.

This study was co-sponsored by the Ministry of Education and Water Safety New Zealand (WSNZ). It was commissioned in response to several issues, including recent student drownings on school trips, media coverage about the cost of school pools, and changes to the physical education curriculum. The study looked at:
* Year 6 teachers' perceptions about the level of swimming and water safety skills students have attained by Year 6
* the range of Year 6 teachers' knowledge in relation to swimming instruction
* school arrangements to deliver the swimming component of the curriculum.

This is the home page for the Attendance and Absence in New Zealand Schools publication series. These reports document the surveys of state and state integrated schools designed to capture student attendance and absence over one week.